CHAPTER LXXVIII.
They talked far into the night. What he told her of scenes already described in this book it is needless to repeat. But he gave her some other details which may interest the reader.
“I felt strongly drawn toward him while I nursed him in this very house, four years ago. There was nothing supernatural about that. I suppose I liked him because I liked him, just as I had done as a boy. No, I had not the least suspicion who he was at first; and when, finally, I had read his secret, I had no intention of letting him know that he was discovered; but I was betrayed into doing so on the occasion of the death of old Ponto. We talked all that night, and he gave me a sketch of his history.”
That sketch, supplemented by additional details that he had afterwards, from time to time, given Charley, would fill a volume. For our purposes, it is only necessary to say that his life, for some time after he left his home, was one of many hardships and vicissitudes. These came to a sudden end.
He had found his way to New York, and was picking up precarious pennies by playing the flute in beer-saloons, when he had the good fortune to touch the heart of an old man by the pathos of his “Home, Sweet Home.” This old man was, as it turned out, of humble birth, and had amassed and retired on a snug little fortune. He was a Bostonian, yet deficient in culture, as was clear; for, though abundantly able to pay for champagne, he was drinking beer. He had lost an only son years before, who, had he lived, would have been of about Theodoric’s age; and when he saw a tear glisten in the boy’s eye as he played (it was his own kind, sympathetic look that had evoked it,—besides, the boy had not tasted food that day), he stealthily slipped two half-dollars into his hand. The boy looked at the money, looked at the man; then plunged through the door of the saloon into the street. The look was the only thanks the old man got, but he felt that that was enough. He followed him and found him standing in the shadow of a booth; and when he laid his hand upon his shoulder, the boy began to sob.
Hunger is king. The pampered pug sniffs, without emotion, boned turkey on a silver dish; a gaunt street-cur whines over a proffered crust.
That very night his new friend rigged him out in a new suit, and telegraphed his wife that he had found a boy for her. They reached Boston next day. That night a family consultation was held between the old couple; and next morning, after breakfast, they announced to Theodoric that they were to set out, in two days, for Europe, where they expected to travel for several years. They were in comfortable circumstances, they told him, but very lonely since the loss of their son. Would he go with them? If he did not like them, they would send him back to America; if he did, they would adopt him as their son. Theodoric, though his pride revolted, was so eager to put the ocean between himself and his former home, that he accepted their offer.
Gratitude being a strong trait in his character, he soon grew deeply attached to his benefactors, notwithstanding their lack of exterior polish. They idolized him. They were both, especially his adopted mother, particularly proud of his strikingly aristocratic air. Accordingly, they lavished money upon him, and constantly scolded him because he could not be induced to spend it. They were made happy, one day, by his requesting permission to employ a violin master. It was the first favor, involving money, that he had ever asked.
He had declined, from the first, to reveal his name. Nor did they press him, feeling that if that were known, it might lead to their losing him. So he took theirs,—a name with which all English-speaking people are familiar; christening himself John, to the deep chagrin of Mrs. S., who had set her heart on Reginald de Courcy.
And philosophers, who saw the trio, explained that it no longer, in these days of steam and telegraphs and wide travel, took three generations to make a gentleman.
The tour in Europe resulted in permanent residence across the water. At the end of three years, the party had returned to Boston, but the old people found that such acquaintances as they had there were no longer to their taste. At any rate, their society was not good enough, to their thinking, for John, who, they were glad to believe, was sprung from Virginia’s bluest blood. So they shook the dust of America from their feet.
In 1858 his kind adopted mother died in Paris,—his father a year later, in London; and Theodoric found himself residuary legatee in the sum of nearly one hundred and fifty thousand dollars (twenty-seven thousand pounds).
In the midst of all this prosperity, Theodoric had not been happy. At times the thought of his own sorrowing mother greatly troubled him. And when he found himself again alone in the world, this feeling came over him with redoubled force. Remorse, at last, growing stronger and stronger, gave him no rest; travel brought him no alleviation; and finally, his longing for home becoming irresistible, he took passage for America, and found himself, two weeks later, strolling through the streets of Richmond, with no very definite plans as to how he should make himself known to his family. It was on the very day of his arrival that he encountered little Laura, and discovered that she was his sister.
“What prevented him from revealing himself while he was in Leicester,” said Charley, “was the approach of the war. He would wait till peace came. His mother had already lost him once, he said. Once he was on the very verge of betraying himself. It was when you so deeply agitated him by unconsciously opening his eyes to the fact that, though he knew that Lucy was his sister, she did not. Don’t you remember?”
“Remember!”
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“And so you are going to escort Mrs. Poythress to Harrisonburg and Taylor’s Springs to-morrow morning. You are not strong enough for such a journey; but now that I know all, I too, say go. Are you going to tell his mother who he is?”
“No; he has expressly forbidden that. I am to choose my time, hereafter.”
“I think it would be cruel ever to tell her. To lose such a son twice! No, let the secret remain with you and me forever.”
“It will be unavoidable.”
Alice looked up.
“You see, he has made a will, of which I have possession; and as, after certain legacies are deducted, the residue of his estate goes to his father and his mother, in equal shares—”
“His father?”
“Yes. I found no difficulty in convincing him that his resentment against his father was unjust, seeing that he had punished him from a sense of duty. The influence that I have over him has always surprised me.”
“Why could you not make him forgive Mary?”
“I didn’t try. A man has but one father; but as for sweethearts, there are as good fish in the sea as—”
“What!”
“Well, except one.”
“Ah!”
“Besides, Mary opened an old wound. Bigotry, as he deemed it, had wrecked his life once, already. I suspect that he is very bitter against her.”
“How sad that he should be so implacable in his wrath!”
“He is equally as ‘implacable’ in his gratitude. Would you believe it? He directs that the freedom of the lad who ‘stood by him’ be bought, and a hundred dollars counted into his hand besides. By the way, I forgot to mention that this lad is none other than my man Sam, who passed into the possession of our family, by exchange, years ago. He, you remember, when you and I were sitting in the Argo—a-Maying—”